The Tale of the Dragon
by Eileen
Summary: Frodo tells a story one night when they are all children. I have changed the ages to put them closer together. Let me know what you think!CURRENT STATUS: On hold
1. Default Chapter

THE TALE OF THE DRAGON

(Disclaimer: most of these characters belong to Tolkien. The story-within-a-story is mine.)

(A/N: This is a cute little Hobbit story that just popped into my head. I know the ages are all wrong; I changed them a bit to make them closer together. If you want to see a more accurate Hobbits-growing-up story, check out "The Heir" by Golden Wolf.)

The Dragon Who Didn't Want to Be 

Mid-Winter Festival was an important time of the year, celebrating the year's end and hope for the future. There were many feasts, dinner parties, singalongs, and just about anything else that you could imagine. The Festival typically ran anywhere from two weeks to "when the drinks run out" (the longest on record had nearly run into Coming-of-Spring, three months later).

This year's festival promised to be one of the best. The barrels of ale had been piling up in the back all week (Frodo and Sam had been taking turns jumping off them into the snow, until Frodo's dad had come along and stopped them), and there were so many people—relatives, friends, relatives of friends, friends of relatives of friends—coming in and out that it was impossible to keep them all straight.

Dinner was over, and the adults had gathered in the sitting room to talk and drink. The sound of their laughter carried faintly to the back room where the boys had been sent. They had been told they could stay up as late as they wanted, as long as they were quiet.

Right now they were involved in a game of dice, and trying not to fall asleep. If you tell a ten- and twelve-year-old they have to go to bed, they'll be up all night arguing; tell them they can stay up, on the other hand, and they'll be asleep by nine-thirty.

"What do you suppose they're doing right now?" Frodo asked.

"Well, not drinking yet," Sam said. "It's still too early. They won't get going seriously for another hour or—"

CRASH! "Oh, no." The boys went to the door and listened for their parents' voices. Instead they heard footsteps approaching the door, and childish protests. Someone must have knocked over a barrel or something. Someone small.

"What've they done now?" Frodo groaned.

"I don't want to know," Sam said, shaking his head. "I don't want to get in trouble . . ."

The door to their room slammed open, and an angry woman came storming in, a wailing child under each arm.

"Never been so embarrassed in all my life!" she was shouting. "It was supposed to be a special night for this family, and you've gone and ruined it for everyone! I'll never be able to show my face in town again!" She dumped the children on the room's other double bed. "Now you stay in here, and I don't want to hear another peep out of you the rest of the night!" And she went out and slammed the door again.

Sam looked at the two and sighed. Meriadoc Brandybuck and Peregrin Took were only four and two, but they had already earned a reputation as troublemakers. "What have you done now?"

"Nothing," said Merry.

"Nuffing," echoed Pippin. He began bouncing up and down on the bed.

"You must have done something," Frodo prompted. "Mother doesn't get angry like that without good reason."

"Wanna cookie?" Pippin said, offering Frodo a half-crumbled sugar cookie that he'd taken—

"Oh, no," Frodo moaned. "Not the dessert tray!" That explained the uproar a few minutes ago. "Please tell me you didn't try to steal the whole dessert tray!"

"We woulda brought it back!" Merry insisted.

Sam was trying not to laugh at the image of two tiny boys trying to make off with a huge silver tray that weighed more than both of them together.

Frodo sighed. "If I've told you once, I've told you a thousand times, don't mess with the dessert tray! It's far too big and heavy for you to handle yourselves. If you want something, ask for it!"

"Sorry."

"Sowwy."

Sam couldn't hold it in any longer; he burst out in a fit of giggles.

"Sam!" Frodo hissed in warning. "Don't encourage them!"

The door opened a crack. "Keep it down in here," Bilbo whispered. "You don't want to upset your mum again. She's worked so hard on all of this."

"We're sorry, Uncle Bilbo," Frodo said.

"Story!" Pippin demanded, still bouncing.

"Stop that!" Frodo snapped, in spite of himself. He didn't mean to yell at the little boy, but it had been a long day and an even longer evening.

Pippin looked at him as if he'd lost his mind, then he started crying. Merry moved to comfort the younger boy, giving Frodo a dirty look.

This was not going well at all. "Do something!" Sam whispered in Frodo's ear.

"What?"

"Tell him you're sorry! Before he really gets going and someone hears!"

"Fine." Frodo sighed and sat down on the other bed. "I'm sorry I yelled, Pip. If you want a story, I'll tell you a story." He stroked the boy's soft curls.

"Really?" Pippin's sobs tapered off to irregular sniffles.

"I know!" Merry announced. "The dragon! The dragon!"

"But you've heard that one a hundred times already!" Frodo looked at Bilbo, who shrugged. It was his finest moment; who could fault him for being proud?

"I know," Sam said. "How about the story of the Dragon Who Didn't Want To Be a Dragon?"

"Ooh," said Pippin. 

"Never heard that one before," said Merry.

Bilbo cleared his throat. "I'll just be going," he said. "Get back to the party before they miss me and come looking."

"Make sure my dad doesn't get too drunk," Sam said. "He always drinks too much at these parties and then gets all grumpy the next day. And then he always yells at me."

"Not always," Frodo pointed out.

"Near enough."

"So, should we begin the story?"

"Yes! Yes!" Two eager little faces looked up at Frodo.

"Very well then . . ."

Bilbo took the opportunity to quietly slip out of the room. He would very much have liked to hear the boy's story himself, but he had duties to attend to. If he was missed for too much longer, someone might indeed come looking for him, and that would be most embarrassing. He shut the door behind him, leaving Frodo to his tale.

_Long ago, _Frodo began, _there was a great and ferocious dragon, whose name was Daramiel. He stood nine feet tall, with a twelve-foot wingspan, and he had long fangs and sharp claws . . ._

_But Daramiel wasn't like other dragons. He wasn't interested in eating people at all._

_All the other dragons thought Daramiel was odd. Even his own family didn't understand him. "Why can't you be like everyone else?" they asked. "Just eat one person, once in a while, for appearances' sake!"_

_And he said, "I don't see why I should, just because everyone else wants me to. I want to live my own life, not someone else's."_

_"But they talk about you!" said his mother, a huge green dragon named Grizelda. "And I have to listen to it, right in front of my face! Their mothers won't let you play with their children anymore because they're afraid you'll give them ideas!"_

Pippin was dismayed that everyone was so mean to "Darmyall", as he called him. "Bad dwagons!"

Merry asked, "What's his daddy say?"

"Well," Frodo said, "he did have a father when he was little, but sadly Daramiel's father was killed by a falling tree when Daramiel was only a baby."

Pippin and Merry looked sad.

Sam could tell where this story was going. It seemed to bear a suspicious resemblance to people he knew in real life. But he couldn't quite figure out why . . .

"Anyway, Daramiel grew up (and it takes dragons quite a long time to grow up) quite lonely. Grizelda tried to at least get him to pretend to be like everyone else, but he wasn't having any of it."

"I won't!" Daramiel insisted. "I won't go to that stupid roasting and you can't make me!"

_Grizelda glared at him. "You most certainly will go! You have to go! Everyone else will be there!"_

_"Then they won't miss me. I'll stay home and read."_

_"What in the name of all the Sacred do you mean by that?" Grizelda was shocked at what she was hearing from her son. "You're a dragon! Act like one!"_

_"Mother, the roastings are barbaric! Why can't we find another way to celebrate the solstice?"_

"What's a sowstice?" Merry asked.

"It's like Mid-Winter Festival," Frodo explained. "Only it happens twice a year, in the winter and the summer."

"Oh."

"The roastings are a tradition reaching back thousands of years, to the very first dragons who roamed the Green Lands! They are our way of honoring our ancestors and their struggles, which made us what we are today!"

_"I know that!" Daramiel snapped. "I just don't see why it should be celebrated by burning people alive."_

_"Because human beings have hunted dragons since they moved into our forests, and this is our way of getting even."_

_"So it's us versus them?" Daramiel demanded. "Why does it always have to be like this?"_

_"You should ask them that," his mother said. "They're the ones that started it."_

_"Oh, what does it even matter anymore? I think I'll go and hide in a cave somewhere by myself for the rest of my life!" Daramiel stormed out in anger, steam coming out of his nostrils._

_Words, once they've been said, cannot be unsaid. But if one is of sufficient wisdom, the damage can be kept to a minimum._

_But Daramiel was still young, and not very wise yet. He didn't see the hurt look on his mother's face as he stomped out the door. He didn't hear her start to cry. If he had, he might have come back and made it up with her._

_Instead, he stayed away for two hundred years._

Frodo looked up and saw that the little ones were yawning and rubbing their eyes. "I think we should stop there for the night."

"But what about—"

"I'll tell you tomorrow," he said, turning down the covers and putting the two boys into bed. "Good night."

"Night, Fwodo," said Pippin.

"Night," said Merry.

Frodo then went back to his own bed. The covers were turned back, so he slipped in, but didn't quite go to sleep yet. He was too fascinated by the noises coming from the outer rooms.

"What's happening?" Sam asked him. 

"Sounds like Round 12 of the Annual Arm-Wrestling Championships."

"Oh, no," Sam groaned. "They'll be at it all night. Maybe into the morning."

A raucous cheer went up without. "Sounds like your dad's winning."

"Oh, not again."

"Too bad he won't remember it tomorrow."

"He never does. Why do grownups always drink so much if it makes them feel so bad the next day?"

"I don't know. I guess it's all just part of the Festival." Frodo rolled over and put out the light.

"Well I'm never gonna drink like that," Sam declared, climbing into bed himself.

Frodo knew he would. Sam already favored his father, and would surely grow up to be just like him, a man of the land. A simple hobbit with simple tastes. 

Just before he fell asleep, Sam asked him, "Frodo? Is the dragon you?"

Frodo thought about this. Sam was not the cleverest of hobbits, nor very well-read, but at times he showed keen flashes of insight. 

But he didn't tell him this. Out loud he said, "Of course not. Do I look like a dragon?"

"No, I guess not. How silly of me. Well, good night."

"Good night." With that, Frodo turned over and went to sleep.


	2. The Great Wide World

THE TALE OF THE DRAGON

**(part 2)**

2. The Great Wide World

The next morning, Frodo woke up to find someone sitting on him.

Someone small.

"More story."

"Let's have breakfast first," Frodo said. "You need to get off me."

"Want story first," Pippin insisted.

"I can't tell good stories on an empty stomach!" Frodo insisted.

Pippin finally let him up, and then went to work on Sam.

"Oof! Get off me, you little--!"

"Up!" Pippin shouted, yanking off the covers.

Frodo whispered, "Ssh! You have to be quiet. People are still sleeping."

"Want drink."

"Okay, but tiptoe very quietly."

So, of course, Pippin bounced around making as much noise as a small boy could.

Merry was still not up yet. He was nearly impossible to rouse at an early hour, as he would be later in life. Pippin had to practically yank him out of bed before he would come with them to the kitchen.

For all their quiet, they found they weren't the only ones up. Bilbo was sitting at the small table, a cup of tea in front of him and his cherished pipe at his side.

"Well, look who's awake," he said.

"Morning, Uncle Bilbo," Frodo said. He grabbed a pot and spoon out of Pippin's hands before the banging started.

"I see you apprehended the cookie thieves. Let me offer you a word of advice, young Master Brandybuck: in future, you may want to consider hiring a bigger accomplice. Maybe next time you won't drop a fifty-pound tray full of pastries."

"There won't be a next time, will there?" Frodo's mother said, joining them. "We've learned our lesson, haven't we?"

"Uh huh," said Merry.

"We sowwy," said Pippin.

Frodo went to the stove to help his uncle with the breakfast. "Mmmmmm . . . eggs. Any bacon to go with this?"

"There will be when your cousin returns from the market. He's gone to restock our supplies. It was quite lively last night."

"And early this morning," Primula added. "Some of them have only just got to bed."

Merry smelled the eggs and asked, "Can I have some?"

"As soon as they're ready," Frodo answered.

"Then story?" Pippin asked.

Bilbo nodded. "I should like to hear the story myself."

"Story?" Primula asked.

Frodo shrugged. "I started telling them a little story last night, to keep them quiet. They've gotten really interested in it so far."

"What's it about?"

"A dragon who didn't want to be a dragon," Sam told her.

"Why not?" she asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Cause he didn't wanna eat people," Merry said.

"He didn't?"

"Yes, and everyone thought he was strange," Frodo explained. He began the story again from the beginning, as they waited for breakfast to be ready. "His mother tried to get him to be like everyone else, but he refused . . ."

By the time the bacon was ready, he had gotten to the part where Daramiel stormed out in a huff.

For two hundred years, Daramiel stayed in his own small cave, by himself. He ate what small game he could catch, and spent a great deal of time thinking about what he had said as he left home.

"He wasn't very nice to his mother," Primula pointed out.

"He was just angry. He didn't mean to say those bad things. He was sorry about it later."

"Then why didn't he ever come back and tell her?"

"I'm getting to that."

Daramiel took a great deal of time to work up the nerve to come home again. He was afraid that so much time had passed that his mother would never forgive him. Of course we all know that mothers love their children no matter what, and if it had been a thousand years, she would still have welcomed him with open arms.

_While Daramiel was away, his mother fretted over him every single day. She wanted to go and look for him, but she had no way of knowing where to begin. Besides, that nice Mrs. Brightscale from across the way said that you couldn't force these things on them; they had to come home on their own._

_On the day Daramiel decided to venture out for the first time in a very long time, a terrible calamity befell the dragons' home. Their ancient enemy, Man, had attacked a city to the north, where no Man had ever been seen before. There were hundreds of dragons killed by the time the news reached Daramiel's cave._

_Grizelda herself had barely managed to survive the attack. She was badly injured in one wing, but still managed to drive back the invaders. She was having her wounds tended to when Daramiel finally came home._

"Morning."

Frodo turned and saw his father standing in the doorway, his pipe in one hand and a mug in the other. "Morning, Father."

"Managed to keep the little ones in line?"

"It wasn't easy, but I told them a story."

"Story, eh?" He sat down and took a sip of his drink. "You always were one for stories. Is it any good?"

"I thought it was," Primula said.

Well, of course she would, Frodo thought. She was his mother.

"I'd like to hear this story," Drogo announced after another sip.

"I'm kind of in the middle of it . . ."

"That's all right. You can fill me in later."

So Frodo picked up from where he had left off.

The first thing Daramiel noticed when he ventured out of his cave for the first time in two hundred years was that everything seemed much closer than it used to be. When he had entered his self-imposed exile, the nearest town had been hundreds of miles away. Now it was only down the road (which was also closer than it used to be—he was sure it hadn't been right outside his door before).

_Then he noticed that there were people here._

_Everywhere he looked there were folk of the various races coming and going. Tall Men, shorter Hobbits, Dwarves on their way to the distant mountains . . . even a few Elves here and there. "How could this be?" Daramiel thought to himself. "Where did all these people come from?"_

_A young woman stepped out from behind a tree, saw the dragon, and ran screaming. "Wait!" Daramiel cried. "I won't hurt you! I just want to know—"_

Pippin was distressed by this latest turn of events. "Oh no! Poor Darmyall!"

"Poor who?" said a woman's voice.

Pippin looked up at the new arrival. "Mummy!" he burst out, leaping into her arms. "Darmyall's mummy hurt really bad, and he run away and, and, and he not wanna eat people!"

"Oh, really?"

"I've been telling them a little story about a dragon," Frodo explained.

"A dragon who doesn't want to eat people?"

"It's just something I made up," the boy admitted sheepishly.

Merry and Pippin tugged on Frodo's sleeve. "More story! More story!" they demanded. "What happen to Farmyall's mummy?"

"Well . . ."

"And where all the people come from?"

"I'll get to that," Frodo said, "after we have breakfast."

The children had almost forgotten breakfast in their excitement. They sat down at the kitchen table (all but Pippin, who was sitting in his mother's lap; the adults had moved to the dining room) and ate until everything was gone.

When they were finished, Frodo stood to help clear away the dishes, but Merry demanded more story **now**. Frodo looked over at his mother and father, who nodded.

"Go on," Primula said. "Just this once, you're excused."

Daramiel searched far and wide for his mother, but couldn't find her anywhere. He became quite upset at the thought that Grizelda could be hurt—or worse, that he might lose her forever. He spent days combing Dragondale for her—

"Dragondale?"

"That's the name of the dragons' home country," Frodo explained. "The capital city is called Dragondell."

"Like Rivendell, where the elves live," Sam said. 

"Yes, like that."

"It big?" asked Pippin.

"Very big. Dragons are usually quite big, so they need big houses to live in. They have nice big gardens to play in, too. So Daramiel had quite a lot of ground to search to find his mother, so it took him quite a while . . ."

When Daramiel finally found Grizelda, it was in the Master Healer's chambers. She was having her injured wing tended to by two assistants. She had trouble sitting up because her legs were so weak—she'd taken arrows in both legs as well, and lost a great deal of blood besides.

_"Mother?"_

_As soon as she heard his voice, she lifted her head and smiled. "I knew you'd come back to us," she whispered._

_"Can you forgive me for the awful way I treated you?"_

_She didn't say a word; she didn't need to. As soon as he was close enough, she threw her arms around him and held him for as long as she had the strength. And so it was that Daramiel finally came home._

"Awwww," said Pippin.

"That's nice," Merry agreed.

"Is that it?" Sam asked.

"Oh, no," Frodo said. "There's still the tale of how they went looking for a new home after their old one was destroyed."

"But that can wait," said Bilbo, who'd come to join them. "Right now there's nearly a foot of fresh snow outside. Who wants to go make snow babies?"

"Me! Me!" The two little ones eagerly waved their hands in the air. Even Frodo was tempted by the sight of fresh snow. "Come on, Sam, let's go!"

"What, no more story?"

"Later! There'll always be more stories, but snow doesn't last forever! Get your cloak and let's make a fort!"

Frodo's father was watching them out the window and wishing he could join them. "Look at him!" he said to Primula, pointing to where Bilbo was helping the two little ones roll up a ball of snow. "Ninety years old and still playing in the snow like a kid! I hope I have that much energy when I'm ninety."

"Go on then," his wife said softly.

"What?" He looked up and saw Frodo waving for him to come join them.

"Days like this don't last forever," Primula said.

"But I haven't—not in years—and it's just—oh, all right." Drogo put on his coat and went out.

It was the finest afternoon he'd spent in years, and one Frodo would remember for years to come.


End file.
